I
KEEPING +HE
fAI+H
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Catholicism has played a part in Deas life
since his birth in Portland in 1947. From spiri
tuality to culture to education, the church has
been there, and its left Deas with an unwaver
ing faith.
“1 don’t know that there’s room for conflict
as much as there’s room for my own individual
conscience,” says Deas, referring to how he
incorporates his homosexuality with his faith.
“There’s not conflict in my faith in the church.
1 can live my life as a gay man without con
flict... . The church does not say it’s wrong to be
a homosexual"— but it does say to practice
homosexuality is wrong.
W hile Deas may have no spiritual conflict,
church politics are another issue. “I’ve had
priests.. .tell me to leave the church,” says Deas,
explaining that he’s been a thorn in the sides of
some clergy with his unyielding advocacy of
queer Catholics. One archbishop, says Deas,
suggested Dignity U SA members take an easier
path by breaking away and beginning their own
denomination.
Some queer people indeed do leave the
church, and that’s the thorn in Deas’ side.
“W hen I see people leaving the church I
become frustrated,” he says. “We need people
from within to make change happen. My greater
frustration is not so much with the church, but
with the church driving people away.”
Despite the church’s formidable infrastruc
ture, Deas says he’s hopeful that Dignity’s efforts
will lead to a more accommodating tomorrow.
“We do have a hierarchy that we have to deal
with and answer to,” Deas acknowledges, adding
that change “is going to happen from the bot
tom up.”
He adds: “I’m very excited as I see the future,
because the church now is more moving toward
the center point; they’ve always been to the
extreme right. I’m seeing more and more parish
es becoming welcoming.”
And his Catholic faith, it seems, will be a
source of strength in his efforts. “It’s given me a
very strong sense of my own personal being, of
my self worth,” says Deas. “I feel very good about
who I am and where I am in my spiritual life.”
Nelly Kaufer
‘T h e r e ’ s
A REAL
D IFFEREN CE
BETWEEN
SPIRITUALITY
AND R E L IG IO N ’
f anyone should be nominated spiritualist-
at-large, it’s Nelly Kaufer. T he self-
described “Jew-Bu” (a person bom to Jew
ish heritage who has strong Buddhist leanings),
says that when she arrived in Oregon in 1970,
spirituality was not considered politically cor
rect.
“I was tom apart for talking about it,” she
says of her experience at Womanshare, a piece
of lesbian-owned land in Southern Oregon.
“But it was there that I looked at the hillside and
T he Rev. Cecil Prescod
felt a sense of how connected I was. I began
teaching meditation, and started understanding
things, and consequently it’s not my primary
what it was like to experience this thing called
community.”
life.”
Her primary community, she says, is equally
This thing called life is something Kaufer has
accommodating but still not fully understand
embraced wholeheartedly. Since her early days
ing.
as an Oregonian, she’s put her degree in
“My friends respect my spirituality, but they
transpersonal counseling— “teaching people
don’t understand it, so I feel a little split,” she
how to be present to themselves as a way to deal
says. “I’m always trying to bring these different
with the craziness of our modem lives,” as she
parts of my life together, but I think that’s pret
describes it— to work as a therapist for individu
ty much what everyone does.”
als and couples. She wrote a book, A Woman’s
Guide to Spiriti4al Renewal (Harpers, 1994), and
is currently at work on a book about mindful
ness.
u l t ir a c ia l
She is also an active member of P’nai Or,
which she describes as a Jewish renewal congre
o p e n
gation.
“W hen I was growing up in the 1950s,
Judaism was pretty bankrupt for a lot of us,” she
says, explaining her thirst for renewal. “There’s a
t’s a peculiar turn of events.
real difference between spirituality and religion.
“Back then we burned them at the
Spirituality is making a deep connection with
stake,” says the Rev. Cecil Prescod face
yourself and something greater. Hopefully com
tiously. The ordained minister with the United
munities can nurture that, but often times they
Church of Christ is answering the question of
don’t, and that’s where my story starts.”
whether the U C C shares any similarities with
Kaufer describes P’nai Or as a wonderfully
Quakers.
inclusive community, citing the dropping of the
He adds, ironically, “Historically the U C C
word “he” and sensitivity around issues such as
has been a denomination that’s put a heavy
homophobia.
focus on social justice.”
Still, she says, her spiritual journey is far from
Prescod, who is African American and bisex
complete. She feels a definite split between her
ual, is quick to offer more examples of how the
lesbian community and its spiritual counterpart.
U C C has grown and departed from its violent
“My religious community is very welcoming
past. He points to the church ordaining an
and supportive, but I feel different,” she says.
openly gay person in 1970.
“I’m not getting married and doing lots of other
“I was raised in the U C C — a liberal, Protes
tant denomination,” adds Prescod, explaining
that the church has always been part of his life,
though to varying degrees.
The New York City native recalls going to
Sunday school, being raised in the church, but
not feeling particularly spiritual until he was
about 16.
“When I was a teenager, I experienced an
epiphany, a conversion experience,” Prescod
says. “I became aware of a personal God and
came to experience the love of God through
Jesus C hrist.... Prior to that experience, I’d pret
ty much decided I was agnostic."
Because of the U C C ’s brand of progressive
theology, his newfound faith posed no problems
with newfound sexuality. “In the church I was
raised in, you never heard any anti-gay rhetoric.
It wasn’t an issue,” Prescod says, adding a clarifi
cation: “At the same time, while I never heard
any anti-gay preaching, I never heard anything
pro-queer. But it was an environment that was
affirming of human rights.”
Today, Prescod worships at the Ainsworth
United Church of Christ in Northeast Portland.
I
‘M
AND
AFFIRM IN G’
I
,
He describes the church as “multiracial, open
and affirming.”
As a reverend, though he currently leads no
parish, he has had the opportunity to inject a
pro-queer element into theology. “A lot of times
there are certainly people, and maybe more than
one category, who have questions about their
sexuality,” Prescod explains. “I try to help them
work through their process and get to a place
where they can affirm who they are. Then there
are people who’ve been injured by what they’ve
heard in churches.”
Such injuries in mind, Prescod is aware of a
perception that traditionally African American
churches have sometimes been labeled as less
tolerant than even some mainstream churches.
“I certainly think it’s a misconception,” he says.
“I think homophobia is in all of society. It’s man
ifested differently in different organizations.”
What makes the charge so inappropriate,
says Prescod, is that “traditionally...African
American churches have taken in those who’ve
been rejected, persecuted. African American
churches have a history of welcoming the
stranger and the oppressed.”
Prescod does grant that these days he sees
“more of an influence of white religious conser
vatives” in some African American church
communities.
“W hen that occurs,” Prescod warns, “it’s
really important to look at the history of
those...religious conservatives— who’ve histori
cally been on the wrong side of civil rights.”
‘ I HAVE
PASSION FOR
G od ’
he Rev. Berdell Moffett remembers a
picnic in Las Vegas in 1983 when she
met her partner, the Rev. Casey
Chaney. “W hen I met her,” recalls Moffett, “she
didn’t have any beliefs.”
Chaney agrees. “Berdeli was more spiritual at
the time,” she admits. “I was mainly a hostile
agnostic. Berdell said, ‘Maybe your God is too
small. Maybe you need to look at God in anoth-
* »♦
er way.
Chaney says she did that, but not till she got
to a very low point in her life. “During a painful
time, I was sitting alone,” she relates. “I said,
‘OK, God, whoever you are, whatever you are, if
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